Linden Lab Sells Desura Game Distribution Platform to Focus on Virtual Worlds (As Its Company T-Shirt Affirms)

Linden Lab has sold the Desura game distribution platform purchased during Rod Humble's tenure as CEO of the company, and this company T-shirt is a good way of explaining why:

The statement on the shirt came up during an all-hands company meeting held shortly after Ebbe Altberg became Linden Lab's new CEO, and it's a salty (and wearable!) way of saying this:

Transitioning Desura to a new owner is great for Linden Lab and our customers, as it allows us to further enhance our focus on creating the ambitious next-generation virtual world, while continuing to improve Second Life and growing Blocksworld. 

And yes, it's an official company shirt (though I'm guessing they might not wear it in public, but then maybe so). "The next time you're in SF," company spokesperson Pete Linden tells me, "you might spot some Lindens sporting them in person too."

Seems like a good way of focusing on the company's core business. (But then again, if Desura was extremely profitable for Linden Lab, they'd probably still be holding onto it.)  We did see a lot of potential to grow Desura, for as Iris argued last year:

Desura is Steam for indie games. That's not an oversimplification or a way for me to kind of explain it in terms most people can understand... That's just what it is. Steam has been around longer than Desura and deals with bigger titles and studios so it's not fair to compare them in terms of their scale and reach, but if you're big on indie games you're probably big on Desura too... Getting the right degree of attention at the right time on Greenlight isn't easy, and tons of good games just don't make the cut. Even so, Greenlight has been one more way to increase the visibility of indie games, making services like Desura that offer them in abundance even more valuable and in-demand. Their other main digital distribution competitor, Origin, only offers EA titles, so it's not a valid option for a growing number of players. It's also worth taking into account that Desura's DRM-free stance, significant modding community, and use in conjunction with Humble Bundles and similar events have made it something of a darling among a subset of PC gamers. With all that in mind, Desura is nothing to sneeze at.

Then again, neither is building a whole new, VR-compatitble virtual world.

Thanks to the Linden insider who shared their "we're the shit" shirt with me!

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Comments

[Fuzzball Ortega]

Dang.....I'd like to work for Linden Lab, if only to get the t-shirt.

[Saffia Widdershins]

And considering the shite that's going down with regard to #Gamergate, maybe getting out of independent game distribution is a canny thing in business terms for the Lab to do?

[Ciaran Laval]

Well that's likely to be photoshopped in a rather predictable manner.

Desura seemed to fit in with the direction Rod Humble wanted to take Linden Lab, they've changed track under Ebbe.

[Skate Foss]

Just Glad to see the Lab beating their chests. As SecondLife residents it's very nice to know our Linden overlords are showing pride in our world. Comforting to know the gorillas are back happily banging on things.

[Metacam Oh]

Imagine if the Lab could just go back and insert Ebbe instead of this 3-4 year detour with Kingdon and Humble. They'd might not be currently trying to dig themselves out of the virtual world stone age.

[Leo]

I would wear that shirt anyday ;)

[Remus]

companies printing T-shirts like that raise a red flag with me.

That is not photoshopped, merely an indication of what you are dealing with.

[EI Consulting]

When will Linden Lab sell for US$2.5 billion like Minecraft?
http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2014/09/making-sense-of-microsoft-minecraft.html

[EI Consulting]

Selling the table silver means it's an Asset Sellout to compensate for Declining Revenues...

[shirc desantis]

Firing up the GIMP to make my own (personal use only natch) version right now :)

[melponeme_k]

@El Consulting

The table silver would Second Life itself along with its Marketplace app.

I've never heard of Desura before LL inexplicably purchased it and haven't heard anything else since. Since it seems to be a gateway platform/pipeline for various games, it would require a lot of man hours that don't benefit LL's core service. They are a Virtual World company not a service provider for various other game companies.

[Issa Heckroth]

Wow, I bet that will sell at least half a dozen copies!

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

But literally they ARE "the shit" when it comes to virtual worlds. Who else has non-mmo virtual world that makes money. Well Sony, but they're shutting theirs down.

LL has zero real competition. As much as we complain about LL, and in some cases rightly so, no one else has been able to do better.

As for Desura, it's an "also-ran", GoG and Steam are the big leagues.

[Iggy]

They are the shit. Sometimes, however, shit runs downhill from the outhouse and smothers customers in piles of doo-doo. Just ask an educator foolish enough to have trusted the Lab.

Maybe they can begin to make nice, and show some of that old gorillas-banging-on-stuff spririt by making a few thousand real, not virtual, Ts and sending them to their remaining premium customers? Size L please. LL, you have my physical address.

[Arcadia Codesmith]

Second Life is already a game development and hosting platform. It's just an antiquated, clumsy and prohibitively expensive platform.

If the next iteration of SL proves to be cheaper and more powerful for game design and deployment, then Desura is at best irrelevant and at worst competing for the same potential client base.

[Jo Yardley]

What a vulgar shirt.

[melponeme_k]

@Jo

It is, but it is an understandable, vengeful response to the Tech bigwigs trying to poo poo and bury the importance of Second Life. Second Life is the ONLY VR that survived, thrived and still makes money. All others failed.

I think the industry trying to rewrite history is really awful, deceitful and more than just a bit fascist. But then Tech worlds are mostly fascist, so it shouldn't be a surprise.

[EI Consulting]

What was the Desura purchase and selling price?

[Stephanie Anne]

I want this shirt so badly.

[EI Consulting]

SL Forum 03-27-2006 Question: What would make a good competitor for Second Life? Answer: I say Garry's Mod... GMod already gives you the ability to run your own sim, with the server option. It lets visitors come by your sim. It lets you build inside your sim; you can both save what you build and save the state of your sim; and best of all it's very possible to both import and export objects to-and-from GMod -

That was 2006, now we have Garry's Mod 13 + Standalone Version 14.01.22 in 2014!

http://forums-archive.secondlife.com/108/6a/96447/1.html

[melponeme_k]

@ El

Oh that deluge of people raving mad for Gary's Mod. LOL. Version 14 whatever will be number 1 on the Christmas list this year.

People don't want to mod anything themselves. Facebook, Google are proof positive that people want things done for them. That was the big reason why Second Life, while hitting it big, didn't go super nova to same extent that WOW did. Blizzard does everything but play the game for the millions upon millions who use their product.

The turning point for LL in SL2 will be how much will be on the rails and how much will be mod.

We already see in HiFI that mod is minimal. Those crappy avatars with their mouths hanging open will be what you will get. Sure they'll say they can be changed, but that is just to fool the fools who use SL. You see they need us. At least until those hypothetical millions come through the door.

[iisingh]

quite obviously a misprint.
One extra world on the shirt that needs to be removed "the".

[iisingh]

world >>> actualy word... gotta love autocomplete